adminNews Editor
EVERY February and March usually sees Ordinary and Advanced level school-leavers and their parents on the foot of the decision-making valley, with both parties cracking their heads on what career path to follow. It is every parent’s dream to have the best out of their children, but the dream usually fades away like morning dew as company closures have become the order of the day.
Although it is now 34 years after independence, the British education system still forms the fabric of Zimbabwe’s education system as it is nurturing people who want white-collar jobs after completion of their studies.
With many graduates roaming the streets in search for jobs without relevant experience and skills that empower them to be relevant to the job market or to become job creators, the option of vocational training may be worth the venture.
Having realised the gaps in the education system, a Presidential Commission of Inquiry into Education and Training was set up in 1999 and came up with its report, but implementation took years, resulting in President Mugabe taking a bold decision to appoint Cde Josiah Hungwe as the Minister of State to liaise on Psychomotor Activities in Education last year.
According to the registrar of Uganda’s Kampala Polytechnic, Mr Sam Owor, the need for technical education is important for any growing economy.
He said technical people were relevant to the development process of any nation.
In Zimbabwe over 200 000 O-Level graduands are not taken up either by tertiary education nor by the formal economy, leaving them stranded hence the need for psychomotor activities in schools.
Experiences from other countries like Kenya, Tanzania, China, India and Taiwan have proved that the psychomotor component of education and training is a major factor in the growth of the informal or non-traditional sectors through the provision of appropriate entrepreneurial and practical skills that enhance job creation.
While most secondary schools were busy opting for the prestigious subjects like Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Management of Business, English in Literature, Mathematics, Further Mathematics and Accounts, to mention but a few, one school in Chimanimani District chose ‘‘the dirty road’’ after realising the importance of vocational training.
The school, Nyahode Union High School, is set to become the model post- O-Level Technical and Entrepreneurial Training Centre in the country.
Cde Hungwe recently visited the school where he explained the mandate of his ministry.
He said his office was responsible for spearheading the mainstreaming of the psychomotor concept into education and training in order of strengthen entrepreneurial, technical, vocational education and training.
“Following last year’s harmonised elections, President Mugabe appointed me as the Minister of State for Liaising on Psychomotor Activities to deal with a multiplicity of challenges, the major one being co-ordinated efforts to correct the education system which is failing to address the socio-economic needs of the country.
“According to the Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation (Zim-Asset), this sector still faces a challenge of a curriculum that does not match the development needs of the country.
“The above observations were also revealed by the 1999 Presidential Commission of Inquiry into Education and Training including development of an education curriculum that values gifts and talents as well as taking cognisance of the services and development needs of the country. My ministry’s key function is to liaise with stakeholders on strategies for accelerating the process of infusing the psychomotor concept into education and training to ensure that pupils or students, school-leavers, college and university graduates, including those in informal and adult education, are equipped with appropriate knowledge and skills relevant to the world of work,” said Cde Hungwe.
Nyahode Training Centre principal Mr Rob Sacco said a model Technical and Entrepreneurial Skills Training (Po-Test) Centre has been developing in Chimanimani at their centre for the past 29 years.
“Based on experience at Nyahode Union Community Trust Technical College over the past 29 years and based on the actual curriculum and structures established at the centre, it is proposed that other rural and even urban day schools can also establish similar Po-Test centres to raise the level of technical and entrepreneurial competencies among their graduates, creating future generations of skilled workers and persons, to local and national benefit.
“The primary beneficiaries are and can be graduands from day schools who are from relatively deprived backgrounds which may preclude them from access to tertiary education or formal sector employment.
“Through the Po-Test Centre programme they can instead be equipped as skilled workers and persons able to develop either as self-employers or as useful employees for small and medium enterprises,” said Mr Sacco.
Besides a wide range of academic and commercial subjects, Nyahode Union High School offers Zimsec technical vocational subjects among them woodwork, building, metal work, fashion and fabrics, agriculture and computer studies.
Mr Sacco said every Form One pupil is made to choose two of the six or seven Tech-Voc subjects offered at the school. The pupil will follow those two subjects along with a balance of academic and commercial subjects up to Form Four.
“On receipt of the O-Level results slips, the out-going Form Fours are brought together at the school where each fills out ‘Destination Perceptions’ questionnaires. Each pupil expresses his or her preferred career destinations and evaluates how each subject he or she would have taken at the school has been useful in terms of career choices. He or she then expresses what further training he or she needs to achieve their destinations of choice.
Our staff members then analyse these questionnaires in conjunction with O-Level results achieved and then offer future training and education to each O-Level graduand,” he said.
In a meeting in February, International Labour Organisation’s chief technical director (skills for youth and rural development), said improvement of national competencies was a must-do if Zimbabwe does not want to remain a supermarket for South Africa.
“South Korea was poor during the 1960s. After 15 years of focus on technical-vocational training they are now one of the leading technological economies in the world.
“In like manner, Singapore, a small city-state, by focusing on technical-vocational education and training, has turned into the global capital of biometrics.
“Indonesia, Malaysia and Indonesia, among other Asian Tigers, have also transformed their economies by a concerted and co-ordinated focus on post- matriculation, or post-O-Level training in technical and entrepreneurial competencies. These economies in the Asian countries have blossomed to their current economic strength and financial sustainability.
“Zimbabwe is a blessed country. It has a largely literate and numerate population willing to work. It has rich soils and many resources. It will not take very much to turn Zimbabwe into an African tiger,” he said.
Online Reporter